The Man to Reestablish the GOP—Maybe

If the battles roiling the Republican Party over the last four years were a Star Wars film, last week’s elections might be titled “The Establishment Strikes Back.” No matter what you call it, the star is Chris Christie.

After suffering repeated indignities at the hands of conservative activists and political neophytes, the party’s donors, consultants, and less Tea Party-friendly politicians reminded the country that they too can win—and also sit on their hands whenever the GOP nominates candidates they dislike, just as much as any grassroots conservative group.

But this bit of conventional wisdom, while truer than most, can be overstated. The Virginia GOP’s struggle to reconcile its socially conservative and more moderate business über alles wings predates the Tea Party. Christie first rose to national prominence not as a pragmatist but a tough-talker who wasn’t afraid to tell members of government unions—even public school teachers—to jump in a lake.

In fact, Christie’s bad reputation with many Tea Party types stems at least as much from withholding his tongue lashings from Barack Obama—or directing them toward conservative excesses—as his genuine offenses against conservative ideology.

Personality explains Christie’s success more than pragmatism. The New Jersey governor may not be a moral crusader, but unlike Rudy Giuliani, Bill Weld, and his predecessor Christine Todd Whitman, he has been quite socially conservative for a blue state. He held out against gay marriage as long as politically feasible—albeit without taking many risks—and vetoed Planned Parenthood funding five times.

If Christie is the 2016 Republican presidential nominee, fully expect the Democrats to run the usual ads inveighing against social extremism and the war on women. They will probably have some impact, but they won’t be as effective as they were against Ken Cuccinelli.

Negative advertising is most successful when it reinforces bad things voters already believe about the candidate. Michael Dukakis as the ineffectual, criminal-coddling dweeb peering out of a tank resonated with the persuadable portion of the electorate. Attacks on the affable Ronald Reagan and the cautious Barack Obama as radicals did not.

Those who deny Christie can win the Republican nomination because of the party’s rightward shift are ignoring two things. The first is Christie’s undeniable political talent (watch him kill his Democratic challenger with kindness for just one recent example).

The second is that the last two Republican nominees were far less talented—or were at least incompatible with the prevailing political climate—and arguably less conservative establishment candidates: John McCain and Mitt Romney.

But it’s true that Christie isn’t guaranteed the nomination. While many Republicans will be eager just to be rid of Democratic presidents, no matter what ideological transgressions they must tolerate in the process, the segment of the party that prefers beautiful losers to imperfect winners is larger than ever.

Moreover, Christie will face stronger conservative competition than did Romney and McCain. Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio all have their flaws. But they have each demonstrated considerable political talent themselves, even if none of them has yet to completely pull it together. And they would each approach the primaries on somewhat more even terms with the frontrunner than a man six years removed from losing his Senate seat or a collection of candidates who seemed to be running for talk show host.

In a not-too-subtle dig at Rubio’s oratory and the Paul-Cruz filibusters, Christie will try to run as the Republican who actually got things done. He will say that he can both work with Democrats and beat them in hostile territory on the biggest stage.

If Christie is not careful, he might come across as a repeat of both Giuliani and George W. Bush. Like Bush, Christie will be running on his ballot-box and bipartisan successes, his impressive-for-a-Republican showing among minority voters, and the contrast between himself and the bickering divided government in Washington.

Bush failed to replicate much of his Texas experience nationally, a real possibility for Christie as well. It is easier to run against a polarizing incumbent governor or a sacrificial-lamb challenger abandoned by the Democrats, as they both did in state politics, than to best a fully invested national challenger.

In an effort to distinguish himself from Cruz and especially Paul, Christie has also at times sounded like Bush-Giuliani 2.0 on foreign policy and civil liberties. This is an abandonment of the more nuanced approach he took in his 2011 speech at the Reagan Library, which didn’t break with neoconservative orthodoxy in any of its particulars, but at least paid lip service to the concerns of less interventionist conservatives in the party.

If a vote for Christie is seen as a vote for bluster at home and bombing abroad, he won’t live up to his potential to grow the Republican Party as much as some of his Tea Party opponents might.

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28 Responses to The Man to Reestablish the GOP—Maybe

This all very predictable, liberals and most of media will say how moderate and compromising he is, later he will be made out as the chief warlord on the war on women, and unlike the author I do believe they will be very effective as a marketing strategy.

If the Republican party puts up another establishment, moderate to run for President it will be the end of the party. We have to stop letting these people chose our candidates if we are to ever reclaim the Whitehouse.

Talent? Cruz, Paul and Rubio? Rubio is a lightweight weathervane politician who has burned all his bridges with everyone in the GOP and now is in a contest with Bobby Jindal for most laughing stock GOPer. Rand Paul’s flighty, quirky and off kilter personality is killing him in terms of his image and viability as a contender for 2016. Cruz is simply working from the Sarah Palin playbook to rake in the cash. Christie has little to fear from the likes of them.

Very curious as to whether he is for bombing abroad, or not. Picking a fight with Rand Paul not dipositive, in my view; nor was his refusal to succumb to Islamophobic hysteria on some local controversy. But will be very interesting to see whether he seems more open to the GOP’s realists or neocons. Of course he will try to avoid antagonizing either, but those who look hard for such things will be able to tell. I can’t, yet.

What the GOP needs, what this country needs, is an Ike. Someone of such stature that he doesn’t have to display his testosterone; someone respected by the vast majority of Americans regardless of political affiliation. We need someone who isn’t merely “bi-partisan”, but is BEYOND partisanship. After a couple of decades of presidential mediocrity, where Bill Clinton (CLINTON !!!!) is looked upon nostalgically, boy do we need an Ike.

What we need — no longer exists.

We may get stuck with another Obama; another little speechifying egotist, who has mastered the newest branch of show business — the modern presidential campaign, without having a single gene in his body for the art of governance.

Or a Ted Cruz — the Right’s Obama, albeit with actual experience in using his fancy law degree in the real world, but with a willingness to say or do anything to draw attention to himself.

Or we may get Christie, a rotund Rudy Giuliani without the lisp, if the grass roots GOPers out in the boonies don’t tire of him as quickly as they tired of Rudy; or we’ll get Hillary. Bill will be 70 in 2016. By then he may have collected all the money he wants from his shady enterprises, and put away his “horn dog” persona. And we will finally have achieved Banana Republic status, where not only is the US presidency passed around from father to son, but also from husband to wife, just like the Perons.

Let’s assume that bombing abroad will no longer win a majority of the voters they are tired as hell of such exercises in foreign policy…peace is the way to go. now ..and please let’s stop acting as just a surrogate power for the Israelis..telll the Lobby where to go and what to do !

I think Puller has it right as to the quality of Cruz, Paul, and Rubio as contenders to Christie.

OTOH, there clearly is a contingent in the GOP who is predisposed against Christie, and as with Romney will be seeking a counter to promote during the upcoming nominations so that Christie can’t pull the party towards the center during the primary campaign.

My bet is that their champion ends up being … don’t laugh … Rick Perry. He may have made a fool of himself in 2012, but there are some really deep pocket businessmen who love him, he’ll be able to carry the Chamber of Commerce if he picks up momentum, and he is deeply embedded in the Religious Right.

And given the embrace of victimhood among the Religious Right – Christie will have to walk very tenderly with any attacks on Perry – to avoid being labelled either a bully, or worse yet, a condescending East Coast type who doesn’t “get” Southern Fundamentalists.

Chris Christie,
“This strain of libertarianism that’s going through both parties right now and making big headlines I think is a very dangerous thought. … You can name any number of people and he’s [Rand Paul] one of them,”

Rand Paul.
“ “Some of these ads,people running for office put their mug all over these ads while they are in the middle of a campaign. In New Jersey, $25 million was spent on ads that included somebody running for political office.”

“Ya think there might be a conflict of interest there? You know that’s a real problem. That’s why when people who are trying to do good and trying to use taxpayer dollars wisely they are offended to see our money spent on political ads. You know that’s just offensive.”

Christie’s main advantage against Cruz, Rubio and Paul is that he is a governor – a Washington outsider running against a non-functioning Washington. However, there are Republican governors who are more acceptable to the base than Christie is or will be.

He favors in-state tuition from “Dreamers,” he cozied up to the amnesty for illegals movement early on. And of course he made the pilgrimage to Nathan Adelson. So he is no patriot and no one who cares about our sovereignty will mistake him for one.

Chris Christie? Just what the Republican Party and the American people need in a Presidential candidate. A “me too” Republican who accepts big government,big taxes and foreign entanglements but all managed in a fiscally conservative manner. Definitely the “lesser of 2 evils” candidate but still the same crap just with different flies.

The headline reads “The Man to Reestablish the GOP…Maybe,” but the real question is:

Does the GOP even want to be reestablished?

On the one hand you’ve got the folks who seem to grasp that the party needs to rack up a few in the “W” column or they’ll be looking at permanent minority status, but are unwilling to further anger the villagers.

On the other hand you’ve got the villagers – who’ve got it into their heads that the way out of permanent minority status is to appeal to an ever-shrinking number of voters with a message of ideological purity.

If I were advising Christie, I’d tell him to sit it out until his party figures out what they want to be.

The New Jersey exit poll conducted for the National Election Pool (ABC, AP, CBS, CNN, FOX, NBC) by Edison Research.

“In fact, if Christie winds up facing Hillary Clinton in a 2016 all-star match-up he would lose his home state by 4 points – 48% for Clinton to 44% for Christie. That result is from the same voters who just gave him an overwhelming victory tonight.”

I’m a huge Warren fan, but I found the article a piece of intellectual masturbation. Or as a front pager on Balloon-Juice put it:

o address the meagre TVP-mockmeat core of Schieber’s cover piece, why the bloody hell would Elizabeth Warren want to run for president in 2016? She worked really, really hard — as did her progressive supporters, me among them — to win a seat in the Senate, where she can make a difference in her target financial-abuse issues, issues she’s spent her entire career fighting. Now a handful of Media Village Idiots want Senator Warren to stop working against the banksters and their paid shills, in order to start a campaign she’s said she’s not interested in, against a woman who’s been her supporter and who’s got one hell of a head start in the race, because… the Village Idiots are boorrrred with Hillary Clinton.

It’s like we’ve got a world-class marathon runner finally starting the race of a lifetime, and “some people” want to pull her out so she can compete in the figure-skating trials instead. Sure, it’s an insult to both marathoners and skaters, and it’s unlikely she could win, but it would be so much more entertaining for the spectators!…

If we legalize illegal aliens, if we give illegals in-state tuition (effectively discriminating against American citizens in favor of illegals), we are giving away the country.

On the issue of immigration, the restrictionist position is very popular, and more importantly, necessary to save the country.

I don’t care how conservative Christie is on other issues. If he gives away the country, he is no good. Moreover, on that one issue, being conservative could be a winning strategy. The idea that a person needs to moderate and let in millions more foreigners in order to attract swing voters is ludicrous.

That’s why I can’t take this talk of Christie seriously.

There is only one reason why immigration restriction is not more popular among politicians: rich, selfish donors who want cheap labor and a broken American society they can control. The consultants are merely their pawns.

On the one hand you’ve got the folks who seem to grasp that the party needs to rack up a few in the “W” column or they’ll be looking at permanent minority status, but are unwilling to further anger the villagers.

Again, though, being anti-amnesty won’t hurt them getting a few in the win column. It’s not pragmatism motivating them to go squishy on amnesty, it’s money.

On the other hand you’ve got the villagers – who’ve got it into their heads that the way out of permanent minority status is to appeal to an ever-shrinking number of voters with a message of ideological purity.

Well, the way out of permanent minority status sure as Hell is not to import millions of people who are ideologically more tuned in to the other side. What the villagers have got into their heads is that the best way out of permanent minority status is to stop pursuing policies that encourage the importation and reproduction of people who vote against you, and discourage the reproduction of people who vote for you.

I can understand the need for moderation, but not on an issue where being a moderate means importing more of your enemies. We need to stop the shrink, not acquiesce to it.

Christie’s base is big money GOP donors, RINOs, liberals, and the media, but the last groups will eventually turn on him if it comes down to him and Hillary. Just like they turned on McCain and Romney.

It’s what…two years before the nomination process, and I’m going to go with it: Christie will be the nominee. Why?

Cruz is nuts. Rubio comes off like a 12 year old. Rand Paul…no. Pawlenty? Yawn. Huckabee would win by a landslide – in a small corner of Missouri. Any Bush, Jeb or otherwise, has jumped the shark. Jindal is bizarre. Any serious executive governor types out there like Kasich would not have their hearts in the race.

I agree with Jack: If the ‘villagers’ have their way, i.e. an ideological purge of their base and party, they are doomed to shrinking minority status within a system of representative government. Sidelined.

My preferences are Christie and Paul and it’s a shame they could not, apparently, work together. The rest are hacks, whackos or damaged goods.

I doubt the village is bored with Hillary. I think they are arranging for her coronation. The neoliberal Party establishment views Warren as a trouble maker. She is not owned. Therefor She cannot be trusted.

I will support Warren if she runs but would not encourage her to do so. The Party would crush her like a bug. She would become a nobody like Nader or Kucinich.

But wouldn’t it be nice if Hillary had to debate her? And wouldn’t it be really nice if the 2016 election featured Warren v Paul instead of the same old lying corporate whores we are accustomed too.